Being without the internet has gotten for me to be like being away without food or water, or sunlight. It's that important to my existence: I rely on it for my well-being. Without it I begin to crave and be anxious. My mouth waters and my lips feel parched when I ponder my inability to check my email, or click on Facebook. I lower my standards and engage in risky behaviour. I steal unlocked wifi and use other people's phones in public. I sneak away from functions and gatherings and click a few links, meeting up briefly with others who have crept away from the crowd for a moment. The internet has replaced smoker culture.
It's not really the internet itself. I can go cold off of websites I get obsessed with (comics and comedy sites that may or may not show a lot of cat pictures). I don't mind missing news, and I never check weather anyway. I do get irritated with not being able to check facts or investigate hunches, but it's when I can no longer write letters that I become first incredibly frustrated and then brokenhearted, and begin to wilt away tragically. I bet I would die pining for the internet, to be able to connect.
That's what I'm addicted to: making connections. Continuing conversations. Conversations which stimulate and inform, whether I'm the teacher or the one one learning from whatever is being related. I like talking with people who are constantly learning about interesting things. I like to carry on many conversations with many people, some of whom I love, some I barely know, some I've never even met. Most of all I enjoy conversation with my husband. We converse. We make connections, we connect, we are connected. I especially like talking with people who are entertaining and knowledgeable about many things, and my husband is an excellent example of both these things. I love talking to him, even if just over the internet.
The internet isn't quite at the pace of actual conversation, not yet. I like the speed of email and letters through Facebook private messages, or Google+, which is the best for picture letters. Postcards from the internet. I like being able to send pictures to my husband; it makes me start looking around for that which is beautiful or strange or otherwise pleasing to the eye. Looking at things with an appraising mind, motivated by the desire to delight someone I love.
In the absence of being able to talk, I took pictures. Pictures of the last few days without internet. I don't know if they will delight or not, but even if I failed to get the shot: they made me appreciate and enjoy the places I went much more than I would have if I were not taking pictures. Having a camera in my hand made me really look, hopefully made me see. To look around and search for beauty. Finding it everywhere.
Being able to connect to the conversation again after being without it for four days is like shooting up heroin after a dry spell. At least, it's like I imagine a Lou Reed song would feel if it shot up heroin. I wonder if that means I'm addicted to my husband, because it's his conversation I crave the most when I can't have any at all. Maybe I married him to sate my craving for good conversation. He spends a lot of time on the internet. Maybe he's a fellow addict. I hope he likes the way I captured the world for him while we were apart.
The photos I took for for him in my days without internet can be seen the following posts.
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